July 27, this afternoon, Hangzhou Asian Games soccer grouping draw was announced, the national football team Asian Games with Bangladesh, Myanmar and India in the same group. The draw for the national soccer team does not reflect the advantages of the hosts, writes Madsing. If you want to reach the semifinals of the Asian Games, you have to go through South Korea.
China's 99-year-old U24 Asian Games team seems to be well grouped, along with Bangladesh, Myanmar and India. With the overall strength of the Chinese team, and the fact that the participants were generally at least two years older than their opponents, there was not much doubt that they would advance to the top 16 by topping the group. As a result, all parties were generally satisfied with China's draw, but the reality was not that simple.
In the Asian Games men's football group before the draw, the organizing committee and the AFC has drawn up the knockout stage of the confrontation. Under normal circumstances, as the organizer of the tournament, he will certainly "do some articles" in the group draw, is to try to avoid the strongest teams, less strong teams in their own region. For example, the Asian Games men's soccer tournament is the favorite bid is of course the first South Korean team, so in the group draw, the normal practice will be divided into the South Korean team is not in a half of the group, at least in the quarter-finals or semi-finals before the will not meet. Unfortunately, the result of this group draw will be announced between China and South Korea.
According to the matchups drawn up before the draw, if China managed to finish first in their group, they would finish third in a group in the first match of the knockout stage, the 1/8th final, as the four best third-place finishers in each of the six groups, in addition to the top two finishers in each group, would also be given the right to qualify for the knockout stage. If China finishes first in Group 1, they will finish third in Group 2, Group 3 or Group 4. Under normal circumstances, I'm afraid that the Chinese team will be able to pass this hurdle and enter the last eight as well. In the eight to four finals, which is the quarterfinals, China will meet the first place of group five.
Because of this, even though China was the host, the draw class effectively declared the men's soccer team a failure, with the hosts showing no advantage at all, because even if South Korea had been assigned to Group 4 or 6, and even if the knockout rounds had been finalized ahead of time, South Korea would have been drawn into the bottom half of the bracket, which could have been completely different.
